Kao Kalia Yang ’03 (Keynote Speaker)
Kao Kalia Yang is a celebrated Hmong American writer, whose work crosses audiences and genres. Kalia writes, teaches, and speaks about her early years in a refugee camp in Thailand and growing up as an immigrant in Saint Paul, Minnesota, where her family resettled as war refugees when she was six years old.
Her work has been widely recognized, including through the National Endowment for the Arts, National Book Critics Circle Award, Chautauqua Prize, PEN USA literary awards, Dayton’s Literary Peace Prize, American Library Association, Kirkus Best Books of the Year, Heartland Bookseller’s Award, and four Minnesota Book Awards. In 2022, she was awarded the A. P. Anderson Award for Outstanding Contributions to Literature and the Arts in Minnesota.
Her first book, The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir, started out as a personal grief project and letter to her grandmother, who died while Kalia was a student at Carleton. Eventually, her writing became the first Hmong-American memoir published with national distribution about the history of Hmong people.
Yang has also written The Song Poet, Somewhere in the Unknown World, and Where Rivers Part. Further, she wrote the libretto for The Song Poet, the first Hmong opera, as commissioned by the Minnesota Opera. She has also written five children’s books that center around Hmong children.
Kao Kalia Yang earned her bachelor’s degree in American studies with concentrations in cross-cultural studies and women’s and gender studies from Carleton and an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University.
She has gone on to earn prestigious McKnight, Soros, and Guggenheim fellowships. As Edelstein-Keller Writer-in-Residence, she has taught workshops in the Master of Fine Arts program at the University of Minnesota and serves as an advocate and mentor for students. Kalia returned to Carleton for the 2016–17 academic year as Benedict Distinguished Visiting Professor in American Studies and English.
Cheryl Yin (Host)
Cheryl Yin is an assistant professor in the Carleton College Sociology and Anthropology department. She is a linguistic anthropologist with extensive expertise in Cambodia and the Khmer language. She is currently revising her book manuscript Language & Morality: Being Modern in Early 21st Century Cambodia (working title). Her research argues that contestations about Khmer language are ultimately contestations about how to (re)define Cambodian national identity after decades of turmoil and then accelerated economic growth.
Cheryl earned her PhD in linguistic anthropology from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She earned her BA from Pitzer College, double majoring in Anthropology and Linguistics. She came to Carleton in 2023.
Billy Lor (Hmong Shaman)
Billy Lor is a 26-year-old master Hmong Shaman with over a decade of experience in spiritual guidance, cultural consulting, and education. Chosen as a shaman at a young age, Billy stems from a centuries-old bloodline of Hmong shamans, inheriting a deep-rooted passion for preserving Hmong culture and providing spiritual healing.
Billy has performed thousands of ceremonies, assisting people from diverse backgrounds in finding spiritual balance. Beyond shamanism, he is a respected cultural consultant, ensuring accurate representation of Hmong culture in various projects.
Recognized in the healthcare and mental health sectors, Billy provides workshops on integrating shamanism with modern practices. As a public speaker, he shares his insights at universities and conferences, inspiring audiences with his knowledge and experience.
Wattanak Dance Troupe (Opening & Dinner Performers)
Established in 2000, the Wattanak Dance Troupe (WDT) has become a beacon of passion and dedication to Cambodian arts and culture. Founded by Sodanny Eir and Yousedy Peov, and guided by their disciples Sarath Nob and Garrett Sour, WDT is devoted to preserving and promoting Cambodia’s Folk and Classical dance styles.
Their mission is to bridge Cambodian-Americans with their ancestral roots through a variety of captivating performances, immersive workshops, and active community engagement. WDT ensures the timeless legacy of Cambodian artistry continues to flourish for future generations.
Their vision encompasses the creation of a vibrant, multicultural environment that invites people from all backgrounds to experience and enjoy the beauty of Cambodian performing arts.
Vichet Chhuon (Model Minority Myth & Education)
Vichet Chhuon, PhD, is Associate Professor of Education and Asian American Studies at the University of Minnesota. His research has broadly focused on the experiences of immigrant youth and students of color to understand how school institutions might better help them realize their promise. His most recent book Cambodian American Youth, Identity, and Schooling Ethnographic Research, published this year, “examines how Cambodian American high school youth reconcile stereotypes, identities, and school opportunities and the ways these factors impact academic achievement and well-being, through ethnographic research.”
Bic Ngo ’96 (Model Minority Myth & Education)
Bic Ngo, Ph.D., is Professor of Curriculum and Instruction in the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. Dr. Ngo’s research focuses on the educational experiences of Southeast Asian Americans, including Lao American high school students, Hmong American high school and college students, Hmong lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning youth, Hmong refugee parents, and Hmong community leaders. Her scholarship has been recognized with multiple awards, including the Scholar Award from the William T. Grant Foundation and Early Career Award from the Committee of Scholars of Color in Education of the American Educational Research Association. She is the Co-Editor-in-Chief of Educational Studies, the flagship journal of the American Educational Studies Association, and Associate Editor of Anthropology and Educational Quarterly, the journal of the Council on Anthropology and Education of the American Anthropological Association. Her books include Re-membering Education: Erasure and Renewal in Hmong American Education (University of Minnesota Press), Unresolved Identities: Discourse, Ambivalence and Urban Immigrant Youth (SUNY) and Six Lenses for Anti-Oppressive Education (Peter Lang).
Xue Xiong (Model Minority Myth & Education)
Xue Xiong is a teacher at heart. She was a Multilingual Language Learner (MLL) teacher, a district administrative leading Ethnic Studies programming and curriculum development. Currently, she supports students and educators as a Program Director. She is passionate about equitable quality education, youth-centered practices, ethnic studies, and community collaboration/organizing. She is a mother of two children and loves to lounge in the sun with a great book.
Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay (Refugee Lifehack)
Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay is a Lao-American playwright. She is the first Minnesotan artist to be directly invited by the Kennedy Center to be an artist in residence at the REACH. She’s best known for her play Kung Fu Zombies vs. Cannibals and children’s book When Everything was Everything. Her work has been presented by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, Theater Mu, Theater Ubound, Mixed Blood Theatre, and elsewhere.
Saymoukda is currently a Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at Theater Mu, a Jerome@Camargo Artist in Residence in Cassis, France, a Playwrights Center Core Writer, a Lanesboro Arts Artist in Residence, and a Forecast Public Art grantee. Recent honors include a Bush Foundation Leadership Fellowship and a McKnight Fellowship, and dozens more. Community contributions include serving on the City of Saint Paul Cultural STAR Board and Governor Tim Walz’s State Poet Laureate Program Design Committee and Interview & Selection Committee.
Her upcoming plays include commissions from Theater Mu (MN 2026), InterAct Theatre Co. (PA 2026), and the University of MN Immigration History and Research Center (MN).
May Lee-Yang (Refugee Lifehack)
May Lee-Yang (she/her) is a writer, performer, filmmaker, and educator. Her theater-based works The Korean Drama Addict’s Guide to Losing Your Virginity, Confessions of a Lazy Hmong Woman and Ten Reasons Why I’d Be a Bad Porn Star. Along with her husband, she wrote and produced a comedic web series called Hmong Organization. She has also devised theater projects with Hmong youth and elders including the Letters to Our Grandchildren project.
May Lee-Yang’s work has been supported by grants from the Playwright Center McKnight Fellowship in Playwriting, the Bush Leadership Fellowship, the Minnesota State Arts Board, the National Performance Network, the Midwestern Voices and Visions Residency Award, the Loft Literary Center, and the Ordway Sally Award for Arts Access. She is a co-founder of Funny Asian Women Kollective (FAWK), a group that uses comedy to combat the dehumanization of Asian women. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from The University of Minnesota.
Yia Vang (Chef)
One of seven siblings, Chef Yia Vang was born in a Thai refugee camp where he lived until his family resettled in central Wisconsin. A trained chef who started his career working as a dishwasher, Yia uses food to tell a story and believes that every dish has a narrative. Through sourcing what’s in season and combining local traditions with those from his family and cultural traditions, Yia brings Hmong flavors to American palates and invites people to change how they think about food by considering the influences in each bite.
His vision for Vinai, his new restaurant concept, (slated to open in 2024 in Northeast Minneapolis) is to create a home for his Hmong food that celebrates his parents’ legacy and tells his family’s story through food. Yia is the host of Outdoor Channel’s Feral along with TPT’s Relish series and has been featured on National Geographic and CNN’s United Shades of America. Among other accolades, he was the cover story of the May 2020 issue of “Bon Appetit” magazine. Yia was also named MSP Magazine’s “Chef of the Year 2019″ and was recently voted “Best Chef 2020” in City Pages “Best-of” issue.